PowerPoint takes the Merge Shapes command to a whole new level. Many of you know that you can merge shapes with other shapes and text, but did you know that you can also merge shapes with pictures? At first, you may wonder what's so awesome about merging shapes with pictures? But play a bit and you'll realize that this option opens up huge possibilities. We will start simple
in this tutorial and explore how you can create cookie cutter shapes with this option.

Launch PowerPoint 2016. You will see the
Presentation Gallery. Here, select the
Blank Presentation option to create a blank presentation with a new slide. Now
change the Slide Layout by selecting the
Home tab | Layout | Blank option. Figure 1 below shows a slide
with the Blank slide layout applied.

Figure 1: Slide with the Blank slide layout

On the same slide, insert a picture. Make sure it
fits within the slide completely, as shown in Figure 2. You may have to
crop your picture or
resize it to make sure it covers the entire
Slide Area.

Figure 2: Picture inserted within the slide

Now, change the slide layout. To do so, select the Home tab | Layout | Two Content option.
Figure 3 below, shows the slide with the Two Content layout, and it also has the full-screen picture we inserted
earlier. This layout contains three placeholders: one Title placeholder and two Content placeholders.

Figure 3: Picture inserted within slide

Now, insert some shapes. We choose to insert the
Rounded Corners Rectangle shape, and placed three instances of it, right on the top of each of three placeholders (one title placeholder
and two content placeholders). Make sure you resize the shapes as
accurately as possible so that they cover the placeholders, as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4: Shapes placed on top the of three placeholders

Now, select the picture first and then all the three shapes. It's important that you select the picture first. Otherwise, this
technique will not work. Once your selections are done, access the Shape Format tab of the
Ribbon (highlighted in
blue
within Figure 5), and click the Merge Shapes button (highlighted in red
within Figure 5).

Figure 5: Merge Shapes button

This brings up Merge Shapes drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 6. Within the
Merge Shapes drop-down gallery, select the Combine option, as shown in Figure 6.

This creates a cookie cutter graphic from the picture, as shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Cookie cutter graphic created from the picture

Type your title text within the Title placeholder, and then you can insert anything within the two Content placeholders, including
text. We inserted a SmartArt graphic and a chart in these placeholders, as shown in Figure 8. Note that when you insert any slide
object within the placeholder you may have to reorder it and send it backwards so that the cutout picture stays on the top.

Figure 8: Table and Chart inserted within the slide

Make sure you save your presentation often.

Tip: Although it's easy to use the Merge Shapes commands in PowerPoint 2016 to create cookie
cutter shapes with pictures, you can use shapes with picture fills especially in older versions to get similar results. Want to learn how
to create Cookie Cutter Shapes with different techniques? Explore the following tutorials:

Jeopardy-Like PowerPoint Template (25 Questions)

Want to play a Jeopardy-like game using PowerPoint slides? Yes, this is absolutely doable but making PowerPoint slides with all the interactivity and
layouts takes too much work. Fortunately, we have done the work for you. just download our Jeopardy-like 25 (5x5) question PowerPoint template, replace
the placeholders provided for questions, answers, and categories, and you’re done! You'll still need a real human being to track scores and you could
soon be playing this amazing game as part of a fun exercise, a training program, or even a quiz show.